#novelesque diary

[occupyenjolras]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Les Misérables - All Media Types Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire, Marius/Cosette Characters: Enjolras, Grantaire, Euphrasie "Cosette" Fauchelevant, Combeferre Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, University, Alternate Universe - College/University Series: Part 1 of Novelesque Diary Summary:

This person, apparently, doesn’t know how to respect literature.

[jediryssabean]

"I love you," Grantaire says--it bursts out of him, something spectacular that doesn't sound like the rustle of pages or the quiet laughter of a stolen kiss in the back of the library. "I love you," and Enjolras never gets tired of hearing it. 

You'll waste it, he's heard before, as if the phrase is something people just accept, people just get, like it's normal, like it isn't something special, like someone isn't giving a piece of their heart to you every single time and--

"I love you," and Grantaire's voice is reverent and his lips are worshipful and Enjolras doesn't--

(i want to give you everything tell me what i can give you so--

so what so what--)

"I love you too," Enjolras breathes out, like they're not in public, like Grantaire's tongue is not attempting to trail along his neck, like he's not saying against the skin there just give me a minute to--to do something, to--"I love your face and your teeth and your hands and your toes, I love you, I love you, I--" and Enjolras laughs because he means it every time and wonders how much of himself he has left to hand out and always finds more to give.

"And God created you," Grantaire says, his hands moving from Enjolras' waist to cup his face. "God created you and said, 'unto the Earth do I give this mortal man. He is not a messiah, or a saviour--but he will save someone. I look upon you and say it is good.' And so it was."

"That's not--" a pause, a beat, another laugh, the pulse of the city, the smell of books and old spines and the vanilla of slowly decaying pages. "That's not actually a verse."

"I paraphrased," he admits. 

"You're very good at that."

A grin, a brush of noses, and then, a whisper, "never let me try and paraphrase you, okay?"

(Only when Grantaire stops cutting himself short will Enjolras comply--and so he says nothing and Grantaire pretends he doesn't notice and then suddenly the city is too loud and the world could do for some quiet then and Enjolras uses his key to open their door and takes Grantaire to the couch where they can't fit comfortably but stay anyway.

Enjolras vices his legs around Grantaire's hips and his arms around his shoulders because, he supposes, he's not quite over the moment when Grantaire disappeared.)

[jediryssabean]

Memorised Passages

Grantaire feelings oh no.

(For Ani.)

-

Pairing: Grantaire/Enjolras

Verse: Noveleqsue Diary

Rating: PG

Summary: His hair flutters like the corners of pages in a book.

Grantaire crinkles at the edges like paper and he smells like old books--or, maybe, the old books smell like him. Vanilla and a little bit of wine and a little bit of dust and ink and too much feeling for still pages. His smile is a reminder of a dogear--a bend that's been used so many times it's imprinted on his face, even when it's not in use.

There are secrets in his laughlines.

Enjolras wants to write all over him, to roll up his sleeves and stop this woman on the street and reveal his forearm, scripted and written on, yes, but beneath the words that he can't keep from replicating, there are veins. Veins and birthmarks and a freckle just so and here there's--

Grantaire bumps into a man and bows in apology. Anger sits in the line of the man's jaw until he sees Grantaire's smile (it's a public one, one that doesn't crinkle as deeply at his eyes, or brightens the colour of his irises), and he smiles too.

Words are hidden in the curve of his spine, the timbre of his laugh and Enjolras will know all these stories and come back for them. He'll recite these things like a bedtime story, like goodnight stars, goodnight air, goodnight my very own Grantaire.

An imprint of lipstick is left behind on Grantaire's face from where Cosette kissed him, happy and affectionate, as they left Marius' flat, close and comfortable, all of them sitting too close and smelling like different colognes and shampoos and--

old pages and vanilla and stale wine

Enjolras wants to stand on the Notre Dame--on the Eiffel Tower--on the wings of a plane and write things in the sky because how could people not understand the beauty of the junction of Grantaire's hip and thigh and how they move together like it's sore sometimes and--

Enjolras could move nations. He could move nations and inadvertently start riots on university campuses and scare politicians with a quiet breath of oh so they don't know what you do with their money do they?

But Grantaire could stop traffic, could smooth out the inevitable frown lines of social workers, could make time stand still to give people time to learn.

(But he speaks so loudly that the story gets lost and--)

Enjolras pauses, breathless with everything and all things and stories and pages and--

They're not home, not yet, the city breathing around them, stories opening and closing and chapters ending on cliffhangers but--

"I love you," Enjolras whispers, but it feels like a shout, lighting his chest on fire from the inside-out.

A splutter, still disbelief, still you can't love half a person, "I love you too."

It's not as loud as Enjolras, but he can see it in the curve of his neck, the  rushing of a blush toward the shell of his ear. 

(I will change the world he thinks.

But he will not change Grantaire. He will listen closely, and shout only when there is a pause.)

[jediryssabean]

permets replied to your post: first five replies to this post get a snippet for...

novelesque diary! please :3

Cosette ruffles his hair with both her hands, grinning widely, her lips pulling back to show her perfect teeth before she plants a kiss on Grantaire's cheek. "Look who's all grown up and handing out keys to his flat," she says.

"You have a key to my flat, mom."

She laughs at that, bells in the breeze, and he presses a kiss to her nose for it, if only because it had been her idea to add the key to Enjolras' gift anyway. "Doesn't count," she protests, her smile sweet like the best kinds of poison. "I picked that from you."

"Key thief," he complains.

They fall into giggles--and it is the first time they have ever been shushed behind the library desk.

[jediryssabean]

obviously i haven't really done much with it but Cosette and R in Novelesque Diary are actually p. good friends. (She bought him a CD after all.)

Same with Combeferre.

Library buddies.

[glitterforplaster]

Alcohol-Filled Balloon

For Ryssa's Novelesque Diary (x).

[jediryssabean]

gondolin-maid wanted Novelesque Diary, with an e-reader, so I wrote this drabble.

-

"Get that out of my flat." Enjolras looks up from his e-reader, rolling his lips to avoid smirking at the look of absolute shock on Grantaire's face. "We do not have electronic books in my flat--can't write in those."

"Can't bend the pages, either."

"A sin."

"No dogearing."

"Blasphemy."

"No pencil smears."

"Are you trying to get thrown out?" Grantaire cocks his head, a smile sitting on his lips. "Or are you trying to get me to stow you away in the bedroom, where e-readers are expressly not allowed."

"That would be devious," Enjolras says quietly, and exits the book on his screen.

"Yes it would."

"And nothing at all like me."

"Oh really?"

[jediryssabean]

My Pages Open Wide

BEFORE THAT ANON ASKED ME TO WRITE R WRITING ON ENJOLRAS I HAD AN IDEA IN THE SHOWER SO

-

Pairing: Grantaire/Enjolras

Verse: Novelesque Diary

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Grantaire sleeps, telling a story with his breath.

—

It’s three in the morning and Grantaire is curled up on his couch (the prospect of joining Enjolras in his bed too much for his brain to bare—not after what he’d done, not yet, and the other bedroom is filled to bursting with art supplies and books that had no other place to be), asleep. Or—he had been, at two fifty-nine. But now it’s three, and Enjolras has taken Grantaire’s hand in his, his eyes wide with no sleep.

“Have you slept at all?” Grantaire mumbles, tugging his hand away from the insistent pull Enjolras has on his fingertips.

“No,” Enjolras replies, “I’ve been reading.”

“Nosy,” he sighs against the sofa-pillow, shutting his eyes to gather the next four hours close to him before he has to wake up and face the day (he promised Enjolras he’d go to classes tomorrow—today—despite the sickness that still rolls within his veins). The pull on his hand resumes, and Grantaire’s feet find the floor—chilled in the nighttime, giving him the boost he needs to stand without falling back over. “What’s the wake-up call for?” He asks around his yawn, following Enjolras to the bedroom, where light from one of his bedside lamps pools on the floor.

Books are open, everywhere, pages dog-eared for reference or pencils resting between one page and the next. Two sets of script decorate the pages Grantaire can see through sleep-bleary eyes. “Get in bed,” Enjolras’ voice carries with it an air of command.

“Why?”

(He runs his palms down the front of his sweatpants, watching Enjolras watch him.)

“A sofa’s hardly a place to sleep,” he says, “and anyway, there’s something I want—“ The light of the table lamp gets caught in his hair, looping with the curves of his curls, casting parts of his face in shadow. “Uh. Could you—“ Enjolras gestures to the T-shirt Grantaire is wearing, a baggy thing with the name of a band he’s never listened to.

It’s three-oh-three in the morning and he’s confused—and now half naked, on his bed, considering Enjolras with a brain that keeps attempting to sink back into the world of sleep. He grabs Grantaire’s permanent marker off of the nightstand, finding the grooves on the cap that Grantaire has left behind with his own teeth, popping it off, revealing the felt tip of the marker.

He spits the cap to the side, and crawls onto the bed, touching the tip of the marker to Grantaire’s skin.

“What are you doing?” He asks quietly, shutting his eyes to the sensation of Enjolras’ wrist trailing in front of his words, the tendons there brushing against the skin of Grantaire’s side, the felt pen a wet weight against him.

“I’m writing,” Enjolras replies, and Grantaire tries to peer at him from slitted eyes. (His blonde curls are falling into his face, his eyes following slowly after the words he’s writing down upon Grantaire’s back, looping his script up toward his spine.) “Go back to sleep.”

He shuts his eyes again, breathing out, rocking to sleep from the sensations. “What’re you writing?”

“Shh,” he says again, and Grantaire hears the flip of a page.

Sleep takes him with gentle hands upon his face and a brush against his hair.

-

Morning finds him with his alarm going off in the living room, down the hall and to the right. It goes off as Grantaire rolls to the side, seeing an empty space beside him, where Enjolras had been kneeling hours before. The books, sprawled there in the darkness, are now closed, stacked against the headboard where pillows ought to be.

(A lot of pages bugle with dog-ears.)

Grantaire stretches his arm to reach for them—stopping short when he sees black words on his arm. His forearm is covered in writing, the junction of his elbow scribbled upon. His bicep, up his shoulder, stretching toward his collarbone—Grantaire as to strain to see.

He brings the words closer to his face, starting at the wrist.

The perfect size for me to wrap my thumb and index finger around to have them touch, it reads, like a bracelet. He uncurls his fingers around his palm. Sweats when I hold it, perfect to cover up that mine does too.

Up his forearm is scrawled perfect length to reach across the table and shut my laptop. The junction between his forearm and upper arm reads, the perfect angle for carrying books. Grantaire shifts his gaze to his right arm and finds more of the same—except this time, the palm of his right hand reads differently, tiny lettering curling up his fingers, toward his middle finger where his pencil usually rests.

Perfect for writing stories.

He reads the writing that wraps around his torso—constantly shifting to read as much as possible, bending in ways he wasn’t sure he could manage before today. His left shoulderblade reads holds a world made of books and sadness and shitty movies. His right reads, holds a world made of books and snark and decent literature. (These worlds are half of Grantaire, each important to him.)

His feet hit the floor for only a moment before moves, grabbing at the shirt he’d shed before the sun was up, pulling it over his head (carefully, trying not to smear the marker still sitting on his skin). He’s down the hall already when he can see again, taking a right, heading toward the kitchen, the thudding of his feet against the floor timing with his pulse (pounding loudly in his ears).

Enjolras is in the living room, chewing absently on the end of a pen, with one of Grantaire’s books open on his lap, already showered and dressed for classes today. (He wears one of Grantaire’s shirts, his jeans recycled from the day before.)

The end of the pen comes away from his mouth when Grantaire steps into the living room (hardly dressed for classes yet, but there’s still time) and he’s going to speak—Enjolras’ eyes light up with a comment and the pen marks his place in the book—

But Grantaire cups his face in both hands, hands that are scribbled upon like diary pages, every piece of him labeled in significance. His thumbs rest at the corners of Enjolras’ eyes as he leans in, curving his spine like a bow. Their noses come together—and Grantaire is a least relatively certain that Enjolras hasn’t written on his face.

He doesn’t know what to say. Can’t say anything at all.

Enjolras moves the book out of his lap.

Grantaire takes the book’s place there.

And he brings their lips together, moving their mouths with practiced ease.

He wonders what Enjolras would write on his tongue, if he could, as he threads his fingers into Enjolras’ curls. He wonders what Enjolras has to say about a lot of things—why he bothers to read the books Grantaire writes in, why he does anything he does.

But he can’t ask any of these, his chest too tight with something.

“Sorry,” Grantaire says with a breath against Enjolras mouth. “Sorry, I just—“

“Shh,” Enjolras pushes air between his teeth—he does that a lot, Grantaire realises (quirking a smile as he does). “I’m reading a story,” and his fingers ghost over the words he’s written on Grantaire’s arms. “We’ve got five minutes to spare, at least.”

(He’s going to be the death of me, Grantaire thinks, already considering the things he’d write on skin this perfect, he’s going to be the death of me.)